raising mice to feed chickens? bad idea? okay its a bad idea.

[Molpet]

Run your Idea by the two major animal rights organizations and see what they think about it. My feelings is that they would think that feeding day old mice to chickens is worse than feeding day old humans to crocodiles.

Remember this. There is already a requirement that you purchase a Federal permit to get into the rodent growing business with mandatory testing and inspections to make sure that you are not abusing your tame rodents or poorly carrying for them.

He is in Canada.. not sure what their laws are

 

[Al Gerhart]

Kind of silly to feed expensive feed to rodents then turn around and feed the rodents to chickens. Feed conversion per pound of meat goes way, way, down. Plus the disease factor. Chickens are just packed with various diseases and viruses that are held in check by the bird's immune system, just waiting for a crack in the resistance of one bird to wipe out a flock. Adding another layer of bacteria and viruses just makes things more likely to go wrong.

Waste or overage, too many rodents, not enough customers? You would still be better off marketing in advance and keeping pace with the production rather than disposing of excess inventory feeding them to birds.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

You're thinking too small!

The answer is use all the mice to catch coyotes, and feed the coyotes to the chickens!

You'd probably want to cook the coyote flesh (a king cooker seems like the best approach), but it's a lot more protein than a bunch of day old mice!

 

[CindyinSD]

No need to raise mice here. In fact I bought Buckeyes because I read that they find their own mice. Can’t have a cat... I’m allergic... but I like chickens better anyway. DH was almost giddy with delight the first time he saw one of the pullets running with a wee mouse dangling from her beak by its tail. That’s my girl!